


Rainbow Tree

by DestielsDestiny



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Angst, Character Study, Force-Sensitive Poe Dameron, Gen, M/M, Maybe - Freeform, POV Second Person, sorta - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-05
Updated: 2016-04-05
Packaged: 2018-05-31 09:56:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,892
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6465814
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DestielsDestiny/pseuds/DestielsDestiny
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You see the world in Shades of Rainbow.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rainbow Tree

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: I own nothing. Second person pov.

You are five when your mother plants a tree in the back garden of the house where you were raised. You remember watching her loving smooth soil over the tiny sapling's roots, remember the way the leaves opened that night, swirls of silver and blue and gold and purple blazing to life in the dark Yavin air. 

You remember thanking your mother for the Rainbow Tree. You remember your father laughing, saying thank the Jedi. 

You remember the look of puzzled happiness on your mother’s face when she finds you lying out under the tree's branches in the morning, branches that are now tall enough to reach past her shoulder. 

You remember the feel of her fuzzy sleep clothes caressing your sleepy cheek as she carries you back into the house, your small hand reaching out towards dancing colours that you are too young to realize only you can see.

\--  
You are eight when your mother dies, fading away like the changing of the seasons, rapid and swift and final, right before your eyes, with all of the sadness, and none of the joy. 

You lie under your Rainbow Tree every night for a week, waiting for the branches to regain the colour that has leached from the extremities like a fading sunset with every breath Shara Bey takes towards her last. 

You dash into the house on the eighth night, the tree suddenly finally just as black as the shadows surrounding it. There’s a strange man standing in the doorway to your mother’s room, dressed as black as the tree shouldn’t be, his hair glinting in the lowlit braziers your mother picked out last winter. 

You remember the flash of blue burning out from the man’s eyes as he turns at the sound of your soft footfalls, the oceanlike depths seeming to stream into the air itself, lighting up the whole room like daylight. 

You remember being eight years old and thinking that Luke Skywalker is the most beautiful thing you’ve ever seen. 

You remember being eight years old, and hating the Jedi more than you’ve ever hated anything in your whole life, because your mother is gone and your tree is black and all Luke Skywalker can do is hold you while you both cry tears as opaque as the world is suddenly black. 

\--  
You are ten when the Tree becomes a rainbow again, bursting into bloom on a spring day as Luke takes you for your first flight in an X-wing. He lets you take the controls for a brief moment, and you dip the nose just low enough to brush the edges of the topmost branches. The Tree bursts into shades of Orange and Red in response, and you laugh out loud. You remember the rumble of Luke’s ribcage as he laughs with you. 

You touch the ship down on an angle, a couple inches too close to the front door for comfort. Han claps you on the back as Luke lifts you down from the cockpit, Ben a sulking presence in the background. You whirl around towards Luke, thanks bubbling up to your lips in time with the smile threatening to split your face. It’s the first time you’ve smiled in two years. 

You catch sight of your father’s darkly clouded face over Luke’s shoulder, and suddenly you don’t feel like smiling anymore. 

You are ten the last time you ever see the Skywalker-Solos, all together as a family, as they once were. 

\--  
You are eleven when your father forgets your birthday for the third time in as many years. You dash out to the Tree to find the branches a plain, stark brown, as normal and ordinary as the branches surrounding it in the forests beyond the garden. 

You are eleven when you decide the Force is overrated. And that the Tree is just a tree. 

\--  
You are fifteen when the second Jedi purge occurs, newly started at the Republic Flight Academy and already beating all of the Heroes of the resistance's records in the air. You find this rather unsurprising, considering who taught you to fly in the first place. You keep this to yourself. 

You don’t remember how you heard about it. You just remember waking up one night, and knowing that somehow, they were all gone. You don't remember how you knew who the they were. You'd only ever met one Jedi before. 

You remember crying yourself to sleep for the first time in five years, because your Tree is halfway across the galaxy, and could be dead as well, as dead as the man who gave it to your mother, for all you know. 

\--  
You are sixteen when you pass your last flight qualifier, the youngest graduate in the Academy's admittedly ridiculously short history. You don't call your father. You don't call anyone. You remember sitting in the comm unit station for what seems like hours, staring blankly at a blank space where long ago memorized comm frequencies hover in shades of purple and blue, for your eyes only. 

"If you ever need me Poe, you only have to call, and I'll be right there, just as soon as I can get R2 to steal me an X-wing." 

You remember shoving your fists so hard into your eyes you have bruises ringing them for a week. You don't call anyone. 

You remember thinking there was no one left to call.   
\--  
You are still sixteen when you receive your first official fighter aircraft, complete with its own Astro-mech unit. You remember watching the little guy roll eagerly around your feet, excited squeals of playful wonder translatable even through Binary. You remember kneeling in front of the droid, trying your hardest to forget how and from who you learned Binary in the first place. 

You remember the feeling of laughter bubbling up in your chest as the droid bumps haphazardly into your leg, seemingly somehow too big for its little height, awkward as a newborn Bantha, remember the feel of a once familiar name coming unbidden to your lips, remember the taste of blood thick and hot on your lips as you bite your traitorous tongue to prevent the name from spilling out. 

You remember the feel of that secure ball of circuits and heart, wrapped securely in your arms for the first time, as the bemused Tech unit blandly intones "This droid's designation is BB-8."

You remember the concerned beeps of BB as the your laughter breaks forth in great, ugly, gulping gasps, spattering pinkish saliva across the deck. 

You remember reaching out a hand to pat a metallic orange head, trying very hard to not remember whose favourite colour orange was, words tripping from your mouth before you can really think it through, "It's okay Buddy, everything's fine."

You remember the feeling of surprise that seizes your heart when you realize that somehow, in that moment, you actually meant every word.

\--  
You are twenty when Leia Organa recruits you for the Resistance she is forming. It’s been a decade since you saw any member of the Skywalker-Solo Clan, and you aren’t sure who is more surprised that you haven’t grown that much taller than she is by now. 

You remember it takes the General twenty minutes to talk you into following her out into the unknown. 

You remember the recruitment pitch began and ended with the words Luke Skywalker.  
\--  
You are twenty-two when you go home for the first time since joining the Academy. You greet Kes with a hug, holding on as long as he ever allows. You stumble out to the backyard afterwards, brushing tears from your eyes with every heavy step, following the echoing memory of the little boy you used to be. 

You sit under the Tree all day, and all night. You never catch even the barest hint of colour from a single branch. 

\--  
You are twenty-six when you fly a maneuver Wedge Antilles bets Han Solo Luke Skywalker himself couldn’t have flown. 

You spend the night steadily helping the General drink her way through Wedge’s Blue Vodka stash. 

You never fly that particular maneuver again. 

\--  
You are twenty-seven when Kes passes away. You are on a mission in deep space, only making it back home after he’s already buried. The Tree is as colourless as old style Republican milk. 

You don’t stay long. 

\--  
You are thirty when the General first sends you after Luke Skywalker, and you can’t help but wonder what took her so long. 

You are thirty the first time you acknowledge that Luke is missing at all

You don’t find him.  
\--

You are thirty-two when you see a lightsaber for the second time in your life. You stare at the red glint reflecting off the strangely childish mask before your face, remember the face you know lies beneath it, remembering the way gentle blue light played across curly black hair, patient mismatched hands guiding growing limbs in an intricate dance of colour and heat. 

You are thirty-two when you go searching for Luke Skywalker yet again, and find something else instead. Something strangely like hope.

\--  
You are still thirty-two when that curly haired boy rips your mind into more shreds than the falling leaves of your long forgotten Tree. 

You are still thirty-two when you watch a faceless white drone turn into a living, breathing, thinking person. You are thirty-two when you fly a TIE Fighter for the first time, your hands ghosting over the controls like you were born to it. 

You are still thirty-two when you name your first liberated ex-storm trooper, laughing while flying for the first time in two decades. 

You are thirty-two when you crash a ship for the first time, hitting hot sand while remembering two little boys who loved to roll around in leaves as multi-coloured as the Tree which dropped them around those boys’ heads like a loving caress. 

\--  
You turn thirty-three the day you follow in Luke Skywalker’s footsteps and blow up a planet killing super-weapon. You are thirty-three when you become a mass murderer. 

You are thirty-three when you find out where Luke Skywalker is. You are thirty-three when the General sends someone to find her brother. Someone who isn’t you. 

You are thirty-three when you sit down as Finn’s bedside, and let a tear slip steadily down your face, followed by another and another until your eyes are swimming and your cheeks are achy and tachy. 

You are thirty-three when Kylo Ren kills Han Solo. You are thirty-three when you finally let go of Ben, once and for all. 

\--  
You are thirty-five when you kiss Luke Skywalker full on the lips in the Hangar Deck of the Resistance base on D’Quar. You think that it tastes like the sweetest summer rain after a long drought. 

You are thirty-five when Luke kisses you back, holding onto your shoulders like a man afraid of drowning. 

You are thirty-five when you look into a pair of blue eyes, and smile, like its going out of style. 

You are thirty-five when you start believing in the Jedi again, and somehow, for the first time in thirty years, you just know that somewhere out there in the galaxy, your Tree is as rainbow coloured as you remember it always being. And you hope that somewhere out there in the black, your mother is there to see it. 


End file.
